As part of the Great Blue Wall initiative, designed to accelerate ocean conservation and regenerative economic development in the Western Indian Ocean, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and mangrove restoration project developer Blue Forest Company announced a new blue carbon partnership for mangrove restoration.
Announced during the UN Ocean Conference, the partnership is designed to restore and preserve extensive tracts of mangrove forest financed through carbon credits where the majority of the net income generated over the multi-year project would be channelled to the local communities living alongside those mangrove forests.
With work starting in Mozambique, the initiative helps deliver the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 14 – Life Below Water (SDG 14) and many of the other inter-related SDG Goals.
Adapted from articles by the IUCN and Blue Forest.
Mangroves are salt-tolerant trees with submerged roots that provide nursery and breeding grounds for marine life, that then migrate to the reef. Mangroves also trap and produce nutrients for food, stabilise the shoreline, protect the coastal zone from storms, and help filter land-based pollutants from runoff.
Learn more about mangroves and their restoration in ICRI’s Restoration Hub, here.
